be all my sins remember'd
by mirai3k
Summary: What keeps them going is what keeps them together.


**notes: **yoshino/aika; yoshino/mahiro; unrequited mahiro/aika; canon compliant for early episodes. mentions of violence, past (canonical) character-death and bereavement; implied unrequited romantic feelings between adoptive siblings. basically, all the standard fare with these kids.

_x_

_You're going to die._

There are days where Yoshino wants to hiss it through his teeth.

Maybe it comes from a selfish place. It's every man for himself these days, or so Mahiro keeps saying as he sways on the spot, keeps bleeding, keeps singing her name under his breath like it will cut through all the smoke and mirrors and reveal the face he most needs to see, or, at the very least, the faces he needs to cut through to make peace with it all.

Yoshino knows there's no peace out there for him or boys like him. Nor will there ever be as long as they continue to live like tragedies waiting to end.

It's in the same way that Yoshino knows _better_ and even Mahiro would concede to this in the way that he does, grumbling, _Yoshino has never steered me wrong, have you now,_ and turning towards him, a conspirational look thrown his way.

And in those moments, Yoshino does nothing-can _do_ nothing-but bite back all his lies and smile.

x

The thing is, Yoshino knows Mahiro better than anyone. And Yoshino knows the other part of the story, the part Mahiro can barely admit to himself because for all the raw instinct and cold violence that makes up Mahiro, Yoshino has always been better at picking up these things.

Of course, he understands the obsession. It's impossible not to. Aika was Aika and there was no getting around it, no getting around _her, _and she made sure of that.

He has always been private with his grief but he's not sure whether it's because he knows what he knows or because they are alone now with nothing but each other that there are moments where a part of him wishes that they could share it. They are fleeting but they catch him off guard, make him want to say: _Come here. Sit down. Sit still. Let me tell you something. Promise you won't hate me. Promise you'll survive it_.

(And then, if they ever make it past that:

_I miss her too. I loved her too. And if I could bring her back, I would, faster than a heartbeat, maybe even for you._)

It's never that simple though. Mahiro doesn't know how to sit down, sit still. All he knows is motion and the powder-blue glow of magic as it escapes him. He's burning his way through until there's going to be nothing left but ash and a fading comet tail, an afterimage of a memory.

Sometimes, Yoshino will look out of the corner of his eye to see if he's still there, still sleeping, still standing, still breathing. And sometimes, Mahiro will catch him, give him a look like glass and mumble, _I don't need you to worry about me,_ and Yoshino will tell him, matter-of-factly, not to make it so easy then.

(Sometimes, he thinks he might be waiting for the inevitable, for the moment when Mahiro cracks and breaks into a hundred thousand pieces, still on fire, always on fire.

Because sometimes, he can't imagine it going any other way.)

Later, Mahiro will apologize for snapping at Yoshino because he's the kind of person who finds it easier to say _sorry_ than _thank you_ even though they both know he doesn't need to bother with either.

And then there's the fact that if anyone should be apologizing for anything, Yoshino knows that it should be him.

x

As much as it's about Aika, it is and it isn't.

It is about Aika in the way that it is always going to be about Aika. Yoshino knows and understands this but, ultimately, one of two things are going to happen: Mahiro will solve the trail Aika left behind or die trying. The former is some sort of far-fetched hope at this point but Yoshino doesn't really like to think about the latter, or what would come next if it came down to that.

Hakaze had laughed and said she hoped he knew the difference between whatever they were to each other and where it took them. He hadn't wasted time explaining it to her. He doesn't think anyone else will be able to wrap their head around it, doesn't expect them to either.

What keeps them together is that they have to keep going and what keeps them going is that they are together.

It is a difficult thing to separate; they stopped bothering with it some time ago.

x

(It's just that-

-sometimes, Mahiro reminds him so much of her.

Even if they weren't blood, they were still family, still something of the same cloth, same glint in the eye. Mahiro wears that same cruel smirk and veneer of invincibility now, even if that last one didn't do her any good in the end and Yoshino has that sinking feeling that it's not going to do Mahiro any better.

Sometimes, Mahiro looks at him the way _she_ used to look at him and it gets far too messy far too quickly inside Yoshino's head.)

x

And then there's a night where Yoshino thinks he might just slip. There's a conversation, a lull in the air, and he comes the closest he ever has to admitting it.

"I miss her too," he chances it, fingers curled into the sheets out of sight. He waits a beat then another. He's not afraid of Mahiro or what he'll think. No, that would still have been more simple.

"She hated you," Mahiro sighs, sounds so distant in the dark even though he's no more than a few feet away.

"Hate's a strong word," Yoshino swallows, hates that he can hear the click of it in the silence. "Even so, she was your sister. She was...an interesting person. Maybe we could have been friends."

Mahiro huffs a laughs, weary but amused. "That would have been something."

"Yeah," says Yoshino, into the dark. He can feel the ghost of her smile, her hands by his temple, crisscrossing bobby-pins into his hair (can hardly remember the last time he saw her brother smile for real but can't forget the look in his eyes, Mahiro's hands wiping blood off the corner of his mouth).

And Yoshino almost slips. Almost but not quite. "Yeah it would have."


End file.
